Club Jade

Anything you can do to draw attention to your mouth is good. Clueless director Amy Heckerling is making a vampire romantic comedy. I can’t believe they found a way to actually might make me kind want to see a vampire movie. (No, Alicia Silverstone is not involved – Krysten Ritter is – but I am not one to resist a cheap Photoshop gag.) In related news Saturday Night Live’s Twilight spoof has been burning up the internet.

Oh, James Cameron. The New York Times claims that Avatar’s price tag is a cool $500 mil. Well, at least the latest trailer actually bothers to make it look like an action movie.

Mumble mumble fourth. The Los Angeles Times’ Geoff Boucher looks at the difficulty of making upcoming films for several different franchises: Lord of the Rings, Spider-Man, X-Men and Pirates of the Caribbean. On that note, io9 quotes the relevant parts of a /Film podcast where X2 screenwriter Michael Dougherty describes what X3 might have been.

Shocking! ‘Archival footage’ from that cheesy alien abduction movie actually fake. People, did we learn nothing from Blair Witch?

Also… The ‘lost’ cantina scene of Star Trek; Ian McKellen and Viggo Mortensen talk The Hobbit; New poster for Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland.

Tolkien lawsuit settled. The trustees of J.R.R. Tolkien’s estate have settled their lawsuit with New Line over the profits from Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings adaptations. Terms were not disclosed, but that’s certainly one less roadblock to The Hobbit adaption.

• Industry. Warner Bros. is reorganizing DC Comics, relaunching it as DC Entertainment. Diane Nelson, who has overseen the Harry Potter movies, will run it.

• Disney. There’s a new full-length trailer for The Princess and the Frog, awakening more than a bit of controversy. Meanwhile, the documentary Waking Sleeping Beauty, about Disney’s last return to traditional animation, sounds very interesting.
• More, uh, Disney. Pixar folks deny that the Marvel project they’re “excited about” is not, as Entertainment Weekly reported, Ant-Man. I say Pixar is the only studio who could make me consider seeing an Ant-Man movie, and that barely.
• He-Man. At least one property of my childhood is safe (for now:) Warner Brothers is dropping their option on Masters of the Universe. My embarrassment squick thanks them.
• The Road. This years’ Viggo Mortensen genre fix has been pushed back to Thanksgiving.

Geoff Boucher pointed out yesterday that David Tennant is heading to San Diego for the first time – ostenibly to promote his last spin as Doctor Who – and could that perhaps mean he’s won the lead role in The Hobbit? Others are taking the speculation as an excuse to crow that it’s a done deal, but we’ll just have to wait and see.

As for Peter Jackson, he’s denying that we’ll get any casting news at Comic-Con.

Boucher’s also running an opinion poll, where Atonement’s James McAvoy is just narrowly beating Tennant.

Much ado about Wolverine. May 1 brings us the next big X-Movie… Can it save the franchise after the hot mess that was X-Men: The Last Stand? Magneto’s celluloid life depends on it.

Still, despite the movie’s hell-raising early leak, buzz remains strong. (Besides, how hard can be be to go wrong with a big dumb spring franchise action movie? Don’t answer that.) Need a taste? Check out these character spots.

• Daily Mail squees through Star Trek review. Well, I suppose someone has to be first. If you’re looking for for something a tad less exuberant, SciFi Wire talks to ILM’s Trek team about the film’s new/old Enterprise.

• Deathly Hallows adaption will split at cliffhanger. The only surprise is that anyone would be surprised. In more exciting (and perhaps disturbing) news, the original cast will be playing their characters in the epilogue. And if you’re dying for pics, head over to Leaky where they have some shots from filming going down in London.
• More shocking news of shockness. The Hobbit to be two movies. Well hey, that’s a lot of lingering glances and weapon-caressing to be contained in just one movie.
• Perhaps shirtless men will make Twilight slightly more bearable. New Moon’s wolf pack takes it off for USA Today. In related news, David Slade (Hard Candy, 30 Days of Night) will direct the adaption of the third book, Eclipse.

TORn is reporting that negotiations are underway for a trilogy (rather than a dulogy) of The Hobbit films.

Never met a dead horse he couldn’t beat: Harrison Ford tells the Los Angeles Times that George Lucas is considering a fifth Indiana Jones film. Of course he is.

But for those who might wonder about those fleeting non-franchise projects, Red Tails does now have a director, Anthony Hemingway.

• That parrot is definitely deceased: Johnny Depp is reportedly getting $56 million for a fourth Pirates Of The Caribbean film. Fifty. Six. (Or is it four?) Million.

• The no-brainer: Christopher Nolan to make third Batman film, start production in February. Christian Bale, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, and Gary Oldman will return. Nothing sarcastic here, move along.
• Okay, so it’s a prequel. Or something: Guillermo del Toro is directing The Hobbit, if you haven’t heard. But he also wants to do a Frankenstein movie. Hopefully he doesn’t pick up any of Peter Jackson’s King Kong mojo while he’s down in New Zealand.

Peter Jackson is joining Guillermo del Toro and LOTR vets Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens to write the scripts for the upcoming Hobbit movies. Woot!

Rumour has it that Guillermo Del Toro and Peter Jackson have agreed on their choice for the actor to play Bilbo Baggins in the upcoming Hobbit movies. But whether that actor is James McAvoy remains a source of speculation.

Meanwhile, no decision yet on whether Christopher Tolkien has been successful in his attempt to stop the production.

Finally, a few LOTR, SW and other sci-fi actors (including Ian McKellen, Sean Astin, Natalie Portman, Leonard Nimoy, and Kristen Bell) are up for PETA UK’s Sexiest Vegetarian Celebrity award.

The Frodo Franchise’s Kristin Thompson discusses the recent online Q&A hosted by Weta and featuring Peter Jackson and Guillermo del Toro. A PDF file of the chat is available from the fine folks at Weta. There are hints about the mysterious “Film 2.”

Tolkien’s son is making one last-ditch effort to block the production of The Hobbit:

… at a hearing on June 6 Christopher Tolkien will ask a Californian judge to back his claim that he can “terminate” film rights to The Hobbit. He is said to be furious with the New Line studio, which earned £3 billion from the Rings trilogy. Tolkien’s lawyers accuse New Line of “accounting chicanery”. Warner Bros, owner of New Line, declined to comment.

Meanwhile, Jackson and del Toro are moving forward with production, announcing that Sir Ian McKellen will return as Gandalf the Grey, Andy Serkis will be back as Gollum, and that Viggo Mortensen has been asked to reprise his role as Aragorn (even though Aragorn wasn’t in The Hobbit).